


in your multitudes

by besidemethewholedamntime



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Comfort, Constellations, F/M, Non-SHIELD AU, exes au, mild angst with happy ending, team earth november challenge
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:21:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21649756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/besidemethewholedamntime/pseuds/besidemethewholedamntime
Summary: "They’ve become different people, or at least on the surface. Her hair is longer and Fitz has a beard now. They’ve both come further in their career. All the same, there’s a chance, just a chance, that they aren’t so different deep down. That they’re still those two scientists who met, fell in love and the rest just doesn’t matter."Some things are inevitable, after all. Two years later and the stars bring them together once again. My Team Earth November Challenge submission inspired by the constellation horologium.
Relationships: Leo Fitz/Jemma Simmons
Comments: 24
Kudos: 51
Collections: Team Earth's November Challenge





	in your multitudes

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! It feels so good to be posting again and writing again and what a better time to be posting than with my submission for the Team Earth November challenge, which was to create works based around a constellation. The constellation was chosen by the lovely Zuza, and the amazing aesthetic was created by the lovely Al! 
> 
> It's angsty for a solid three seconds in the middle but it does have a happy ending, I promise.
> 
> The title is from 'Stars' as featured in Les Misérables.
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

She thinks she’s alone at first.

The others had been all crowded around the bar when she left, vying for service in a multitude of languages that she found it hard to keep track of after a while. They’ve all been cooped up in the lab for the past three days and now they’re like thirsty animals at the watering hole, desperate for some attention from someone who doesn’t wear a lab coat and have a pair of safety goggles on their nose.

They’re a loud and fun lot, and usually Jemma loves getting lost in the party with them, but not tonight. She’d had a quiet drink with two of the girls, but had slipped out when they started talking to some locals in a manner that Jemma’s never had the knack for. It’s a warm night, with a gentle breeze taking the edge off the humidity and without really thinking too much about where she was going, she’d ended up at the beach and had continued walking until she’d reached a spot where the city lights weren’t quite so bright, and she could look up and see the stars.

“I knew I’d find you down here.”

She jumps, not recognising the voice for a few seconds and by then it’s too late – he’ll have noticed. She’s out in the dark on a strange beach in a foreign country and yet it’s _knowing_ the voice that scares her more.

The sun hasn’t been kind to him in the five days they’ve been here. He’s always been a pasty one, built for the grey and cloudy skies of the North, not the endless blue they find themselves faced with here. A blue that holds the same intensity as it does in his eyes. It was her first thought when she stepped off the plane, how much the sky reminded her of his eyes. That was before she even knew he was here.

“I thought you’d still be at the bar,” she remarks, but to keep her voice light is an effort. It’s the most they’ve spoken in years, far surpassing the head nod that they’ve managed in the past few days.

He shrugs. “Saw you leave. Figured we had to talk sometime.”

“And you thought now was a good time? God, Fitz, you’ve always had the worst timing.”

It was meant to be a rule, one that she made on the spot when she turned up to the lab on the first day and saw him sitting there, pipette in hand. She would not cry or scream, she wouldn’t make a sound. Her face would not betray the life they had lived together, the people they had once been. She would not act as if he were a stranger, someone new to meet; she would act as if he were simply not _there._

The rule is gone now, torn to shreds the minute he followed her down here in the dark to have a conversation two years too late. Of course, it never could have really been a rule to begin with; there’s no way they would have made it three months here acting like the other didn’t exist. For better or worse, they have always been irresistible to each other.

“That’s hardly fair,” he says, eyes narrowing accusingly.

She bites her tongue. There’s no anger now, not really. There never was, just frustration and an indescribable sadness that sometimes chokes her, even now.

“You’re right,” she sighs. “It’s not.” She scuffs at the sand with her sandal. “I came out here to see the stars.”

He nods, coming to stand beside her. He’s so close that she can feel the heat radiating off his sunburn, but she’s sure to anyone else they look like strangers.

In a past life they used to watch the stars together. With him beside her now it’s all she can think about.

“They’re really clear out here,” he murmurs and his voice causes goosebumps on her skin.

“Yes. You can see many constellations here that you can’t see in Europe.”

He knows this of course, but she says it anyway. What else is there to say? _I’m surprised you’re here?_ Except she’s not, not really. There was an eventuality that this would happen. _How are you?_ But can she bear to find out the answer if it’s not the same as hers? _I hate you?_ But she doesn’t, does she? _I love you?_

Perhaps that’s coming just a little too close to the truth.

“You taught me some of them.” He sidles closer, hands in the pocket of his shorts. She wonders if he had to buy a whole new wardrobe for coming here. Back then, in their old life, he didn’t own a single pair. _My legs are too pale,_ he’d laugh, teeth and all. _I’d burn in a minute._

They’ve become different people, or at least on the surface. Her hair is longer and Fitz has a beard now. They’ve both come further in their career. All the same, there’s a chance, just a chance, that they aren’t so different deep down. That they’re still those two scientists who met, fell in love and the rest just doesn’t matter.

In a way she always knew it was going to be Fitz who broke her heart. There’s been nobody whom she’s ever loved quite as much.

“Yes, I did, didn’t I?” She wraps her arms around herself. “Do you remember any?”

He gazes up at the night sky. It’s a cloudless night and the stars shine brightly, like little white paint splatters on an endless canvas of blue. There are a number of constellations able to be seen. He’s always been horrible at remembering the name of the constellations, unusual considering he usually excels at other things he tries, and so she expects him to go for something easy like Carina or Crux. Instead, he points at a simple, fainter one.

“Horologium, isn’t it?”

“Yes.” It almost takes her breath away, though she must have known that he was going to pick that one, she must have. She shouldn’t have asked. “The clock.”

“Time,” he says, not looking at her but still up at the night sky. He has moved closer, rocking on his heels. “Can’t go back.”

“And do you want to?” She swallows, looking up at the pendulum-shaped collection of stars. “If you could, would you go back?”

It takes him only a second to answer. “Every day.”

It’s like the sand is suddenly of the quick variety and if she doesn’t move, she’ll be swallowed up by it. Surprise is first, but then anger. How dare he do this to her? How dare he?

She takes a step away, shaking her head at him. “This isn’t fair, Fitz. This just isn’t fair.”

“You asked me a question. What did you want me to do? Lie?”

 _Yes!_ She wants to scream. _Yes!_ Or better yet, she wants him not to be here at all. She wants him to have accepted another trip, she wants him to have gotten the flight after hers so she got here first. She wants to erase the last five years and pretend she never met him in the first place.

“You can’t just, just follow me here like this and pretend that nothing is happened, that we’re fine. For goodness sake we haven’t even looked at each other and now you’re here talking about how we can just go back.” She’s glad this part of the beach is secluded in the dark – she doesn’t feel so terrible about getting hysterical. “You’re being ridiculous. We can’t go back.”

She has forgotten how Fitz’s anger comes in very suddenly – a tidal wave that swallows him whole. “Hey, I wanted to try with you. I did try. You’re the one who acted like I was dead to you. What was I meant to do?”

“You weren’t mean to be here!”

“And why not, Jemma? Why not? You’re the one who placed career above everything else. Why can’t I do the same?”

Here it comes, the thing that they’ve always been so awfully good at: placing well-placed blows that can bring the other to their knees. A skill it seems they haven’t lost over the years. When they were together, they were always careful, but there’s no reason to be so anymore.

“Oh, real mature. As I recall it wasn’t quite like that now, was it?”

She’s shaking now, the full force of her anger boiling her blood, making her veins itch. There’s so much feeling she doesn’t know what to do with it. Her hands curl into fists by her side.

He narrows his eyes. Even in the dark they are so intensely blue. “Here we go again, blaming it on me. I knew you were going to do this. I knew it.”

And she cannot help it anymore. “You were the one who left!”

“Only because you told me to go!”

“Please,” she hisses, suddenly feeling very tired and very sad. She didn’t want to do this. “You couldn’t wait to leave.”

She had screamed at him, she remembers this very well. She had screamed at him to leave, to just get out because their arguments and their animosity was getting too much. He had pushed everyone away after the death of his mother and so she had fled to her work, finding solace in it as she always has. He, in return, had done the same and it continued for so long until one day she had enough and she had told him, yelled at him to _go, just go_ , and he had yelled back _fine_ and the door had rattled on his way out.

She hadn’t thought he would actually leave and when he did and he didn’t come back she took it as further confirmation that they weren’t enough for each other, could never be enough for each other, and she locked it in the little box in her mind and never opened it again.

Until now, here, in Australia, a multi-disciplinary research opportunity has them standing before each other once again and having a conversation that they should have had years ago.

“Is that what you thought?” Fitz’s voice has dropped to a whisper, as if what she has said has taken the wind right out of him. This is why they shouldn’t fight – they’re too good at it. “That I wanted to go?”

“You acted like it,” Jemma says, lowering her voice, too. “You walked right out and didn’t come back.”

“I thought you wanted me to go.” He laughs in that un-funny self-deprecating way. “You were always at work and whenever we were at home we fought so much. I thought it was just better if I go.”

“I worked because you pushed me away. You hid your thoughts and you didn’t tell me _anything._ I’d find you sleeping on the couch, half-sitting – you hadn’t even come to bed! You told me you loved me and you didn’t act like it, Fitz.” She knows where she’s going and she’s already forming the words she promised herself she would never utter. “I thought you resented me and I couldn’t bear it so I worked to forget about it.”

It’s like she’s punched him. The wind knocked out of him, he stumbles forward towards her before thinking better of it. “Jemma…” he breathes, and she hates the way he says her name because it’s too full of the way things were before. “I never resented you. Never.” His voice carries a quiet conviction of its own. “Why would you think that?”

There are tears now, in her voice, on her cheeks. “You weren’t there, when your mum died. You weren’t at home.” She shakes her head, bottom lip trembling. “You were with me. I thought you hated me for that. I hated me for that.”

“No, no, Jemma, I could never hate you. Never.” He is crying now, too. “Nobody thought she was that sick and nobody expected her to… nobody thought it would happen that quick. It’s not – that wasn’t something for you to be worried about.”

It’s a weight from her shoulders, something she’s been so afraid of all these years. Fitz hating her, yes, but also the real and genuine fear that she had kept him from his dying mother and had they not spoken just now, she knows that this would have haunted her until her dying day.

“But you didn’t speak to me. You just shut yourself away.”

“I didn’t realise,” he admits. “I was hurt and I was, um… I was sad. I didn’t know what you were thinking. I just saw you go off to work every morning and I – I needed you. I didn’t do a very good job of showing it but I did, Jemma. I really did.”

“We fought,” she says, unwilling to step closer in case she gets hurt once more. Surely it can’t be this simple? That this miscommunication on a minor scale, really, has left them broken and hurting for years. They are both smart people, incredibly so, top of their game, but only now is she realising that they are also incredibly stupid. “We fought so much. All the time.”

“We were hurting.” Fitz shrugs. “It’s easier to be angry, isn’t it?”

It was easier to be angry. It was easier to pretend she hated him than admit she loved him so much she felt like the world stopped turning when he left.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you how I feel,” she admits, moving toward him just as he moves towards her.

“I’m sorry I shut you out.” He looks at the sand. “And I’m sorry I left.”

Her bottom lip quivers. “I’m sorry I told you to go.”

It takes around three seconds, accounting for the sand, for them to close their arms around each other so tightly it feels like they may fuse together, skin to skin and bone to bone. He smells like sun cream and aftershave but underneath it all is the smell that is uniquely him. With his arms around her, on this foreign beach so far from it, she feels like she is home.

“I’ve missed you.” His hand is in her hair. It’s disgustingly sweaty but he doesn’t seem to mind.

“I’ve missed you,” she whispers, and how lovely it is to be able to admit that freely.

When they met in their final year of university, it had taken him six weeks to be able to stumble out a sentence in front of her, looking down at the ground as he did so. When he asked her out, it was at dinner and he was looking down at their joined hands on the table. When they were dating, he had told her he loved her when they lay together with her head on his chest and his arm around her shoulder. The most important things, the things he really feels, he has never been able to tell her while looking her in the eye.

They turn to face the sky, one arm still slung around the other, both pretending they aren’t crying. Emotions have never been their strong but they’re learning, they’re growing, and with any luck Jemma hopes they’ll get to do it together.

“I can’t believe you remembered Horologium,” Jemma laughs wetly, looking up to the stars once again. They went on a trip together when they were at university, a two-week conservation expedition to South Africa, and she first pointed it out to him, the clock constellation that she had only seen in the books her father had shown her. They hadn’t been together then, he had barely become her friend, but she had taken his hand and traced it out in the nighty sky for him to see the magic, too.

“Of course, I did.” She hears him swallow and turns to him but he’s looking up at the night sky. “It’s ours.”

The clock constellation, a relatively simple one, overlooked in favour of the ones with brighter stars and myths attached, more complex in their origin, in their stories. This one, though, has always intrigued her, for it represents something physical, something she knows and understands. And after that trip to South Africa, it became her favourite because she saw it for the first time and she saw it with Fitz.

“It’s quite remarkable, isn’t it?” She uses her free hand to swipe the tears from her face. The night sky and all it holds has always been remarkable to her, but that’s not what she refers to now. No, it’s the fact that she’s here, with Fitz, almost all the way back to the beginning again.

“Yeah,” he manages, his voice sounding choked. “Brought us all the way back.”

“Do you think we could start again?” She asks. “I know we can’t pretend it never happened but do you think we could move forward? Slowly and surely. Do you think we could manage that?”

He looks at her then, a thousand different emotions flittering across his face and it’s with a start she realises she knows them still, after all this time. There are things her brain will never let her forget about him, not even if she wanted to.

“Yeah.” His arm around her squeezes her closer, as though he doesn’t want to let her go, and she understands because she’s doing the exact same thing. “I’d like that.”

They are excellent at fighting, absolute champions, but when it comes to reconciliation, when they want to be, they are even better. Fighters or lovers, it’s all the same, really. The same emotion in different directions.

“I think we’ll be better this time,” he whispers, looking back up at the sky, the constellation that’s brought them together again. Once she told him the story of her father, how he was a busy man but he always found the time to take her outside and show her the night sky in its infinite complexity. _Tell your dreams to the stars_ he’d told her, as she sat, first on his knee and then on the deck chair beside him. _They remember your dreams, you see? And when you’re not looking, when you need it but least expect it, they make them come true._

She’s a scientist first and foremost, never one to believe in whimsical fairy tales that cannot be proven but yet, in this moment, she thinks her father may have had a point.

“Yes. I think we will.”

She leans further into his chest, enjoying the feeling of his arm around her as if they’ve never parted at all. Looking up at the night sky, to the millions of stars holding millions of dreams, she mouths her thanks.

The stars, unconcerned, shine infinitely on.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I hope you enjoyed. Please feel free to leave kudos/comments. Please feel free not to. Either way, I hope you have a lovely day!


End file.
